History of Dental Implants

What is a dental implant?

This is a “root device” made of titanium that is used by dentists for restoration purposes that resembles a group of teeth or tooth.

Loose teeth and missing teeth do not give good appearance, whether one is young or old. Judging from past history, people have been conscious of their looks and ensured that their missing teeth were replaced. Dating back to the 7th century, dental implants were in use, which indicates that since then people started making use of dental implants. In the 1930s, dental implants were actually found in the archaeological burial sites of Mayan. Now the situation has changed since them. Although, perhaps in earlier times, the dental implants may not have been all that sophisticated, now the dentist of modern age has much to offer. The Mayan civilization made use of endosseous implants.

How was the Mayan implant discovery made?

The archaeologist while excavating the site at Mayan burial site at Honduras in 1931, they had found a piece of mandible of Mayan origin, which dates back as far as 600AD. The mandible found belongs to a woman who happens to be in her twenties. It consisted of a three -toothed type of shape that has been placed into one’s sockets of one’s three lower incisor based teeth.

One must take note of the contribution made by the Swedish professor concerning orthopedics, Branemark, who made discovery that titanum happens to be a rather strong as well as non-corrosive metal that can get easily attached to the bone when the implant is placed. In fact, modern dentistry has ensured the best dental implants look more like natural teeth and one need not hesitate to smile once one gets one fixed in one’s mouth.

Branemark, in one of his experimentation, placed titanium device into the leg bones of a rabbit in order to study bone healing. After a few months, he tried to remove the fixed devices, but he found could not do so, as the bone had got attached to the bone. He realized that there was more scope to experiment with the mouth rather than joints and that there were more people who had no teeth rather than those who had joint pains. He termed the bone attachment as “osseointegration” .It was in 1965 that Branemark made use of the first of its kind titanium dental implant into the mouth of a human volunteer.

Over a period of time Branemark continued his research in dental implants and in 1978 he made efforts to commercialize the development as well as marketing of the dental implants made of titanium and as of now nearly 7 million of such implants are being sold under this brand name.

Judging by the popularity the dental insert now, it is noteworthy to realize that its present day success goes back as far as 40 years.

In the 1950s much research was carried out by various scientists and dentists to study bone healing as well as regeneration and came up with their version of dental implants.

Historical genesis of dental implant dentistry:

Egyptians preferred to shape seashells and then hammer them into one’s gums directly in order to have teeth replaced. In 1700s, teeth that were missing were replaced by teeth from donors. The process was no doubt unsuccessful on account of the immune system reacting to the other foreign materials. In 1800s, platinum as well as gold and other metal alloys were experimentally made use of and then placed into sockets, from where the teeth had been recently extracted and also to create suitable replacements. In this case, the long term success rates were not up to the mark. In fact, the success rate was actually poor. In 1952, a doctor in Sweden had by accident discovered that titanium can actually bond rather irreversibly with bone tissues that are in living form. The advent of 1965, meant the onset of modern form dental implant. The method adopted was to implant titanium into one’s bone for no doubt rooting one’s prosthetic teeth. In 1981, Swedish doctor discovered the titanium, and published in his paper all required information pertaining to dental implants. In 1982, the focus of the Conference on Osseointegration in the ambit of Clinical Dentistry turned out to be a guideline for success oriented implant dentistry. In the year 2002, based on ADA survey indicated both oral as well as maxillofacial periodontists, surgeons, dentists actually doubled the number of implants performed by the dentist. Between the years 1995 to 2002, several dental implants took place. Now of course, with all these efforts made by dental surgeons, one can be well assured that dental implants will definitely be of a high order.

Dental implants have not just come into use as of now, but they have been in much use earlier as well. Egyptians of ancient times also were eager to replace their missing teeth and even now a person of modern times also likes his or her teeth to look good.